Talk is cheap.
Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
61–70 of 102 posts
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
Any chance we could live stream this in Boulder?
Unfortunately we're not doing any recordings -- it's hard to be candid and recorded for all history at the same time. :(
Is that called "transparency"[1]?
[1] http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/TransparencyandOp...
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#63A bunch of the folks in this article are Y Combinator or Google alumni, and we're giving a talk on Saving HealthCare.gov next Thursday in SF for anyone who's interested: http://www.eventbrite.com/e/saving-healthcaregov-tickets-118... Let us know if you have questions! Or if you want to help. UPDATE: we seem to be sold out. Trying to find a larger venue. In the meantime, feel free to sign up on the waiting list and yo…
Not to start a political flame war, but... How do you, as technologically savvy people who are in a better position than most to understand the grave transgressions of the NSA, reconcile your support of an administration that has shown complete disregard for our privacy and civil liberties (specifically within the scope of the NSA/Snowden scandal) with your inherent duty, as an engineer of powerful systems, to above…
If everyone tries to reconcile everything the government does, no good person would ever work for the government.
If you want to change it, change it from the inside.
Thats is what they are doing.
People can protest on the streets or online but changing the government from the inside will be more effective.
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can both support building a tool to give people healthcare and be against government surveillance. Most people are able to compartmentalize their support or opposition for various government policies and do not see the doing of one thing they don't like as a reason not to support any other thing the government does.
That's kind of my question though, is how do you compartmentalize that? This may be a personal character flaw, but I definitely wouldn't be able to. The NSA revelations aren't just some small political transgressions, this is a rather world shaking development that shows we have been subject to vast, malicious (i.e. not for our good but for the good of others), and illegal surveillance that has steadily eroded many o…
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Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not to start a political flame war, but... How do you, as technologically savvy people who are in a better position than most to understand the grave transgressions of the NSA, reconcile your support of an administration that has shown complete disregard for our privacy and civil liberties (specifically within the scope of the NSA/Snowden scandal) with your inherent duty, as an engineer of powerful systems, to above…
You can both support building a tool to give people healthcare and be against government surveillance. Most people are able to compartmentalize their support or opposition for various government policies and do not see the doing of one thing they don't like as a reason not to support any other thing the government does.
technically it's not giving healthcare to anyone... but rather providing a means to charge for a base-level. the healthcare law doesn't give any free handout's, even to people who can't afford the "affordable" fees the gov't charges for the base-level healthcare.
(just saying, it matters to be correct on this topic)
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a highly politicized topic. Recording/streaming the event makes it very easy to take an out-of-context soundbite and turn it into a media story that actively hurts their ongoing efforts to improve the marketplace. They may want to keep the TV cameras out for the same reason they're not present in just about any kind of political discussion/negotiation; by the time anyone in government is speaking to media, th…
Recording/streaming the event makes it very easy to take an out-of-context soundbite... I would have concluded the exact opposite. Making a full recording available allows any attempt to quote part the meeting out of context discoverable and provable. Without a recording, anyone that attends the meeting could jot down a quote that serves their purpose and report it without anyone being able to dispute the context (as…
Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Once a juicy soundbite makes the news rounds, a release of the full-recording isn't going to change anyone's mind.
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#67There are plenty more government IT projects for them to save next. The scale of these failures is mind-boggling, and Healthcare.gov wasn't nearly the worst. Here's one I just read about yesterday, might be good for their next project: http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2013/11/26/Another-Fa... That's $1.1 billion lost, another $4 billion planned. I can't even imagine what I'd demand of a $4 billion piece of soft…
I can't find a reference for this, but I've heard that the IRS has attempted several multi-billion-dollar system overhauls, with no success.
It's fascinating how much of the world is run by decades-old software, with no serious hope of an upgrade.
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
Did you redesign it from scratch or were you able to leverage any existing code? Were the original developers developing against a (mostly) static spec, or were the terms constantly being changed up until October of last year? Are there any plans to carry this forward and redesign some of the state exchanges?
Mostly from scratch. Cannot speak directly to experience of original developers, but I could see moving target as being an issue. Would love to see our code open sourced someday and be useful to others, especially state exchanges, but that is a long-term goal. Currently we are laser-focused on getting everything ready to ship by next open enrollment.
would be curious to get some answers as-to why this wasn't the path to building the website all along?
I mean, the original site was awarded to CGI Inc without any biding process... and they aren't even a US company. Why did we not have US professionals/companies build this thing the first go-round?
I could have imagined a High-Tech All-Stars sort of thing... each major US tech company sends 1 or 2 representatives to collaborate and work together to build this new long-lasting piece of national infrastructure.
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#69A bunch of the folks in this article are Y Combinator or Google alumni, and we're giving a talk on Saving HealthCare.gov next Thursday in SF for anyone who's interested: http://www.eventbrite.com/e/saving-healthcaregov-tickets-118... Let us know if you have questions! Or if you want to help. UPDATE: we seem to be sold out. Trying to find a larger venue. In the meantime, feel free to sign up on the waiting list and yo…
Not to start a political flame war, but... How do you, as technologically savvy people who are in a better position than most to understand the grave transgressions of the NSA, reconcile your support of an administration that has shown complete disregard for our privacy and civil liberties (specifically within the scope of the NSA/Snowden scandal) with your inherent duty, as an engineer of powerful systems, to above…
But how would you ever make government better without getting involved? I mean unless you are talking about scrapping the existing system and replacing it, you must be involved in order to change it.
Re: Why the New Obamacare Website Is Going to Work This Time
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not to start a political flame war, but... How do you, as technologically savvy people who are in a better position than most to understand the grave transgressions of the NSA, reconcile your support of an administration that has shown complete disregard for our privacy and civil liberties (specifically within the scope of the NSA/Snowden scandal) with your inherent duty, as an engineer of powerful systems, to above…
If everyone tries to reconcile everything the government does, no good person would ever work for the government. If you want to change it, change it from the inside. Thats is what they are doing. People can protest on the streets or online but changing the government from the inside will be more effective.
This is probably the best reply I've gotten (I've asked this outside of this thread before as well), and my response would be to ask where the line is when one's efforts stop changing the machine (to abstract the discussion away from "government", not to insult it) and begins furthering it's interests. I honestly don't know the answer, and so I ask inflammatory questions to further my understanding of the issue.